In many scenarios, we will get the requirement to upload the reports, tracker from one location to another location , so i decided to write this post to explain how to upload files like excel, txt… with the help of Powershell GUI. Instead of thinking high level, here i had split the three simple task to achieve the file upload functionality in the Powershell.

1. Create Simple PowerShell UI for browsing the location of files  with one textbox and two button type (upload & cancel) with help of system.Windows.Forms
2. In Browse button click event, you can perform the browse with the specific file that need to be upload to destination folder using New-Object -TypeName System.Windows.Forms.OpenFileDialog. These make the selection of files or folders easy for users and prevent mistakes being made in file paths.
3. In upload button click event, you can perform the Move action on the selected file to place on Target location.

When designing PowerShell scripts, I have often found it useful to incorporate a file or folder dialogue to select files or folders. These make the selection of files or folders easy for users and prevent mistakes being made in file paths.

Example:

####################################################### 
#Project      :    Upload the files using Powershell 
#Developer    :    Thiyagu S (dotnet-helpers.com)
#Tools        :    PowerShell 5.1.15063.1155 
#E-Mail       :    mail2thiyaguji@gmail.com 
####################################################### 
#Form class
$Forms = 'system.Windows.Forms.Form'
#Button class
$Button = 'system.Windows.Forms.Button'
#Getting the font details for applying the fields
$FontStyle = 'Microsoft Sans Serif,10,style=Bold'
$SysDrawPoint = 'System.Drawing.Point'
# setting InitialDirectory which open as intially during the click of browse button
$InitialDirectory = "C:\New folder"
Add-Type -AssemblyName System.Windows.Forms
[System.Windows.Forms.Application]::EnableVisualStyles()

#The New-Object cmdlet creates an instance of a .NET Framework or COM object.
#Specifies the fully qualified name of the .NET Framework class. You cannot specify both the TypeName parameter and the ComObject parameter.

$TrackerFileUpload = New-Object -TypeName $Forms
$TrackerFileUpload.ClientSize = '400,114'
$TrackerFileUpload.text = 'dotnet-helpers.com - Please upload Daily Tracker'
$TrackerFileUpload.TopMost = $false

$txtFileName = New-Object -TypeName system.Windows.Forms.TextBox
$txtFileName.width = 280
$txtFileName.height = 20
$txtFileName.location = New-Object -TypeName $SysDrawPoint -ArgumentList (107,39)
$txtFileName.Font = $FontStyle

$btnFileBrowser = New-Object -TypeName $Button
$btnFileBrowser.BackColor = '#1a80b6'
$btnFileBrowser.text = 'Browse'
$btnFileBrowser.width = 96
$btnFileBrowser.height = 30
$btnFileBrowser.location = New-Object -TypeName $SysDrawPoint -ArgumentList (200,78)
$btnFileBrowser.Font = $FontStyle
$btnFileBrowser.ForeColor = '#ffffff'

$btnUpload = New-Object -TypeName $Button
$btnUpload.BackColor = '#00FF7F'
$btnUpload.text = 'Upload'
$btnUpload.width = 96
$btnUpload.height = 30
$btnUpload.location = New-Object -TypeName $SysDrawPoint -ArgumentList (291,78)
$btnUpload.Font = $FontStyle
$btnUpload.ForeColor = '#000000'

$lblFileName = New-Object -TypeName system.Windows.Forms.Label
$lblFileName.text = 'Choose File'
$lblFileName.AutoSize = $true
$lblFileName.width = 25
$lblFileName.height = 10
$lblFileName.location = New-Object -TypeName $SysDrawPoint -ArgumentList (20,40)
$lblFileName.Font = $FontStyle

#Adding the textbox,buttons to the forms for displaying
$TrackerFileUpload.controls.AddRange(@($txtFileName, $btnFileBrowser, $lblFileName, $btnUpload))

#Browse button click event
$btnFileBrowser.Add_Click({
Add-Type -AssemblyName System.windows.forms | Out-Null
#Creating an object for OpenFileDialog to a Form
$OpenDialog = New-Object -TypeName System.Windows.Forms.OpenFileDialog
#Initiat browse path can be set by using initialDirectory
$OpenDialog.initialDirectory = $initialDirectory
#Set filter only to upload Excel file
$OpenDialog.filter = '.xlsx (*(.xlsx)) | *.xlsx | *.txt'
$OpenDialog.ShowDialog() | Out-Null
$filePath = $OpenDialog.filename
#Assigining the file choosen path to the text box
$txtFileName.Text = $filePath 
$TrackerFileUpload.Refresh()
})
#Upload button click eventy
$btnUpload.Add_Click({
#Set the destination path
$destPath = 'C:\EMS\Destination'
#$txtFileName.Text = ""
Copy-Item -Path $txtFileName.Text -Destination $destPath
})

$null = $TrackerFileUpload.ShowDialog()
$txtFileName.Text = ""

Output:

What do you think?

I hope you have an idea of  How To upload the files with help of PowerShell GUI. I would like to have feedback from my posts readers. Your valuable feedback, question, or comments about this article are always welcome.